Lee Child - One Shot

Hutton propped herself on an elbow and looked down at Reacher’s face. His eyes were still the same. Set a little deeper, maybe, and a little more hooded. But they still shone blue like ice chips under an Arctic sun. Like a color map of twin snowmelt lakes in a high mountain landscape. But their expression had changed. Fourteen years ago they had been rimmed red by the desert sandstorms and clouded with some kind of bitter cynicism. They had been army eyes. Cop eyes. She remembered the way they would swing slow and lazy across a room like deadly tracers curling in toward a target. Now they were clearer. Younger. More innocent. He was fourteen years older, but his gaze was like a child’s again.

“You just had your hair cut,” she said.

“This morning,” he said. “For you.”

“For me?”

“Yesterday I looked like a wild man. They told me you were coming. I didn’t want you to think I was some kind of a bum.”

“Aren’t you?”

“Some kind, I guess.”

“What kind?”

“The voluntary kind.”

“We should eat,” she said.

“Sounds like a plan,” he said.

“What do you want?”

“Whatever you get. We’ll share. Order big portions.”

“You can choose your own if you want.”

He shook his head. “A month from now some DoD clerk is going to go through your expenses. Better for you if he sees one meal rather than two.”

“Worried about my reputation?”

“I’m worried about your next promotion.”

“I won’t get one. I’m terminal at Brigadier General.”

“Not now that this Petersen guy owes you a big one.”

“Can’t deny two stars would be cool.”

“For me too,” Reacher said. “I got screwed by plenty of two-stars. To think I screwed one myself would be fun.”

She made a face.

“Food,” Reacher said.

“I like salads,” she said.

“Someone’s got to, I guess.”

“Don’t you?”

“Get a chicken Caesar to start and a steak to follow. You eat the rabbit food, I’ll eat the steak. Then get some kind of a big dessert. And a big pot of coffee.”

“I like tea.”

“Can’t do it,” Reacher said. “There are some compromises I just can’t make. Not even for the DoD.”

“But I’m thirsty.”

“They’ll send ice water. They always do.”

“I outrank you.”

“You always did. You ever see me drink tea because of it?”

She shook her head and got out of bed. Padded naked across to the desk. Checked the menu and dialed the phone. Ordered chicken Caesar, a sixteen-ounce sirloin, and a big pie with ice cream. And a six-cup pot of coffee. Reacher smiled at her.

“Twenty minutes,” she said. “Let’s take a shower.”

Raskin took the heart of downtown. He was on foot with the sketch in his hand and a list in his head: restaurants, bars, diners, sandwich shops, groceries, hotels. He started at the Metropole Palace. The lobby, the bar. No luck. He moved on to a Chinese restaurant two blocks away. In and out, fast and discreet. He figured he was pretty good for this kind of work. He wasn’t a very noticeable guy. Not memorable. Average height, average weight, unremarkable face. Just a hole in the air, which in some ways was a frustration, but in others was a major advantage. People looked at him, but they didn’t really see him. Their eyes slid right on by.

Reacher wasn’t in the Chinese place. Or the sub shop, or the Irish bar. So Raskin stopped on the sidewalk and decided to dodge north. He could check the lawyer’s office and then head toward the Marriott. Because according to Linsky those places were where the women were. And in Raskin’s experience guys who weren’t just holes in the air got to hang out with women more than the average.

Reacher got out of the shower and borrowed Hutton’s toothbrush and toothpaste and comb. Then he toweled off and walked around and collected his clothes. Put them on and tucked his shirt in. He was dressed and sitting on the bed when he heard the knock at the door.

“Room service,” a foreign voice called.

Hutton put her head out the bathroom door. She was dressed but halfway through drying her hair.

“You go,” Reacher said.

“Me?”

“You have to sign for it.”

“You can write my name.”

“Two hours from now the cops won’t have found me and they’ll come back here. Better that we don’t have a guy downstairs who knows you’re not alone.”

“You never relax, do you?”

“The less I relax, the luckier I get.”

Hutton patted her hair into shape and headed for the door. Reacher heard the rattle of a cart and the clink of plates and the scratch of a pen. Then he heard the door close and he stepped through to the living room and found a wheeled table set up in the middle of the floor. The waiter had placed one chair behind it.

“One knife,” Hutton said. “One fork. One spoon. We didn’t think of that.”

“We’ll take turns,” Reacher said. “Kind of romantic.”

“I’ll cut your steak up and you can use your fingers.”

“You could feed it to me. We should have ordered grapes.”

She smiled.

“Do you remember James Barr?” he asked.

“Too much water over the dam,” she said. “But I reread his file yesterday.”

“How good a shooter was he?”

“Not the best we ever had, not the worst.”

“That’s what I remember. I was just in the garage, taking a look. It was impressive shooting. Very impressive. I don’t remember him being that good.”

“There’s a lot of evidence there.”

He nodded. Said nothing.

“Maybe he’s been practicing hard,” she said. “He was in six years but he’s been out nearly three times as long. Maybe he was a late developer.”

“Maybe,” he said.

She looked at him. “You’re not staying, are you? You’re planning on leaving right after dinner. Because of this thing with the cops. You think they’ll come back to the room.”

“They will,” Reacher said. “Count on it.”

“I don’t have to let them in.”

“A place like this, the cops will do pretty much what they want. And if they find me here, you’re in trouble.”

“Not if you’re innocent.”

“You’ve got no legitimate way of telling what I am. That’s what they’ll say.”

“I’m the lawyer here,” Hutton said.

“And I was a cop,” Reacher said. “I know what they’re like. They hate fugitives. Fugitives drive them nuts. They’ll arrest you along with me and sort it all out next month. By which time your second star will be in the toilet.”

“So where are you going?”

“No idea. But I’ll think of something.”

The street door at the bottom of the black glass tower was locked for the night. Raskin knocked on it, twice. The security guard at the lobby desk looked up. Raskin waved the sketch at him.

“Delivery,” he mouthed.

The guard got up and walked over and used a key from a bunch on a chain to unlock the door. Raskin stepped inside.

“Rodin,” he said. “Fourth floor.”

The guard nodded. The law offices of Helen Rodin had received plenty of deliveries that day. Boxes, cartons, guys with hand trucks. One more was to be expected. No big surprise. He walked back to his desk without comment and Raskin walked over to the elevator. Got in and pressed 4 .

First thing he saw on the fourth floor was a city cop standing outside the lawyer’s door. Raskin knew what that meant, immediately. It meant the lawyer’s office was still a live possibility. Which meant Reacher wasn’t in there at the present time and hadn’t tried to get in there anytime recently. So Raskin wheeled around like he was confused by the corridor layout and headed around a corner. Waited a moment and then headed back to the elevator. He folded the sketch and put it in his pocket. In the lobby he gave the guard a job-done type of wave and headed back out into the night. Turned left and headed north and east toward the Marriott Suites.